Founded in 1911 in Jaffa, Falastin began as a weekly publication, evolving into one of the most influential dailies in Ottoman and Mandatory Palestine.

Falastin, forced to leave Jaffa during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, relocated to East Jerusalem in the West Bank which then came under Jordanian control.

It was among a handful of newspapers to have emerged from the region following the 1908 Young Turk Revolution in the Ottoman Empire which lifted press censorship.

[7] The family was financially independent from the Jerusalem Patriarch's charity as it had historically invested in olive oil and soap trading.

Issa's cousin Hanna El-Issa, was editor of the short-lived Al-Asma'i magazine which was first published in Jerusalem on 1 September 1908.

These three mandatories have combined to aid one another in depriving Palestinian Arabs of their rights.The newspaper was initially focused on the Orthodox Renaissance, a movement that aimed to weaken the Greek clerical hegemony over the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem, so that its vast financial resources could be utilized to improve education for the Arab Christians of Palestine.

"[13] Following the first suspension in 1914, Falastin issued a circular responding to the government charges that they were "sowing discord between the elements of the [Ottoman] Empire," which stated that "Zionist" was not the same as "Jew" and described the former as "a political party whose aim is to restore Palestine to their nation and concentrate them in it, and to keep it exclusively for them.

"[13] The newspaper was supported by Muslim and Christian notables, and a judge annulled the suspension on grounds of freedom of the press.

Defending himself in the Ottoman court, he recounted saying "when we said 'Zionists' we referred to the political organisation with its headquarters in Europe which aims for the colonisation of Palestine, the usurpation of its lands and its transformation into a Jewish homeland".

In 1936, along with Al Difaa, the newspaper played a significant role by encouraging readers to join the general strike that took place in 1936 and lasted for six months and giving it the term the "eighth Wonder of the World".

[20] On 19 October 1929, the English version of Falastin published an article titled "Relativity and Propaganda", which was brought to the attention of Albert Einstein, who engaged in a series of correspondences with the newspaper.

The paper thus captured King Abdullah's relations with the people of Palestine, documenting every trip he made to a Palestinian town and every stand he took in his support against Zionism.

A participant in the conference stated that Many people tend to dismiss it as only a newspaper, but in fact, it is a mine of information and documents pertaining to the history of the Arab world.